


The Affinity Rebellion Collection

by toniwilder



Category: Affinity Rebellion/Cemetery Sea, Original Work
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, One Shot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:27:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25880569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toniwilder/pseuds/toniwilder
Summary: A collection of one-shots and short stories for original story The Affinity Rebellion.
Relationships: Prince Warren/Halcyone
Kudos: 2





	The Affinity Rebellion Collection

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CrimsonKappa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrimsonKappa/gifts).



Just after sunrise, the prince with deep circles under his eyes huddled below the awning of her doorway. He came to her with the potted plant in hand, dirt gathered in the lines of his pale palms, and thrusted it forward into her chest.

“Does this mean I’m going to die?”

Halcyone blinked and rubbed the sleep out of her eye. “What are you talking about—”

Prince Warren dropped the plant into her hands and pushed past her into the home. Surrounded by the bright green the ferns and monstera, he looked washed out like a fresh snowfall.

He grabbed his hair in two fists and said. “Oh, this means I’m going to die.”

The plant had seen better days. Halcyone ran her finger over the top of the leaf, feeling the gumminess of an uncared limb. Her lips went to one side involuntarily to keep from yelling at royalty, and she set the plant gently on the window.

“It looks parched.”

“Because I’m parched.” Warren crossed his arms over his chest and pressed into the wall. “Because I am empty of life and waiting for the end. It was supposed to protect me with your spell and it has not worked. Oh I will die.” He pressed his face deep into a dirty rag Halcyone used to clean up after repotting her herbs. “It’s the first omen, Halcyone.”

“Uhuh.”

She went to her bedside table for the cup of water she had drank before Warren burst into the home and tracked back to where she left the plant.

“Where did you place him?” She asked while tipping the last of her water into the pot. The soil darkened and the each drop quickly sunk into the depth of the roots. With her free hand on the table she could already feel the magic come back to its core. Like a dog freshly watered after a walk in the heat.

“I placed it beside my bed, where it could monitor and help me. I did as you said.” Warren turned his body to stare at her woefully. “And it still--… Oh.”

The plant she had given him, a beautiful flowering arum, had already begun blooming once more. She set her empty cup of water on the potting bench and let out a long yawn.

“It… Was parched…” Now stated with understanding.

“Yes, it was.” Halcyone tilted a bloom of white under her finger to tilt towards him. He stepped over gingerly, and if she didn’t know him so well, she wouldn’t have noticed how embarrassment hindered his gait.

Warren reached his finger towards the bloom and Halcyone frowned at the purple sunbursts that colored the prince’s nail beds so much that all but the tips looked oil painted. The same purple, like crushed plums, colored under his eyes. If not for the white blond beard over his mouth, she was sure his lips would be the same. She pulled her hand away, and his finger finally touched the flower. Cautious to never touch skin to skin in fear he might infect her.

The purple under his nails eased, though the circles under his eyes did not.

“You don’t seem very well, Prince,” she murmured.

Warren shook his head.

“I am not.”

Her frown deepened.

“Is there something I can do?”

Warren kept his head lowered, his eyes shaded by a loose strand of white straw hair that hung over his forehead. His eyebrows knotted together and his jaw worked to swallow something, Halcyone couldn’t guess what.

“I suppose not.”

His voice shook. She sighed.

“Sit down, Prince.” Before he could object, she added, “I won’t take no for an answer.”

Warren eased into the only plush chair Halcyone owned, dyed lilac and blue with little dots of starlight added after a night of wine-assisted creative endeavors. He sunk into the seat and covered his forehead with his hand. Meanwhile, Halcyone went to work.

Being an angitia wasn’t so simple that she could fix Prince Warren’s health and fears with a plant and a cup of freshly brewed tea. That would have been nice though. Instead, Halcyone gathered pots of herbs across the cottage into her arms. This one for calm, the other for peace, this other for confidence. Over and over again she glanced at Warren and thought, “Oh, if only I could ease this feeling for him,” and then gathered the bit of magic she had at her disposal for him. All affinity, raised by hand from seeds for him to use when he trembled in the cold of his own illness on the chair of her home.

After gathering the collection, Halcyone emptied the supplies into a onyx bowl and began muddling the leaves. As she worked, the energy from her hand meshed with that of the tendrils easing up from the muddled foliage. When she finished, the concoction had become inexplicably deep with an illuminated liquid. Halcyone dipped filsete, a stone colored by the conjurer’s affinity and, therefore, a blue and red swirl in her fingers, into the bowl and waited.

“Is it terrible I am… almost disappointed?” Warren murmured from where he had yet to move once more. “That this would be the end and I would not have to carry out the awful schemes of royalty any longer?”

Halcyone considered him. “It’s not… pleasant,” she agreed. “But I understand. I think most people would, if they had the heart for consideration.”

“Only you do that for me, my witch,” Warren laughed. “It doesn’t suit many others.”

The filsete, now thickened with the concoction she’d made for him and a glowing white, rolled in the bottom of the bowl. She walked across the room to him and knelt at his knees.

“Here,” she said, and pressed the bowl into his palm.

Warren knew filsete well at this point. Since a boy, before Halcyone had ever been assigned to him as his healer, he had to ingest the stone. The familiarity had bred near contempt and his perfect profile scrunched in disgust at the sight.

“I know.”

He took the stone into his hand, set it onto his tongue, and swallowed.

Prince Warren wept as the stone coated his insides and pressed his head into the top of his thighs. And, just as Halcyone did every time before, she put her hand out for him in case he needed it though he never grabbed it.

The Prince wasn’t one to touch, or hold, or love. He would be lucky to live to be king. Halcyone didn’t like it, he knew she didn’t like it, but she wouldn’t leave him for it and she’d never stop offering her comforts. Not until one of them died.

Then Warren’s hand trembled outward and snatched her fingers, muddled with herb, into his grasp. Though Halcyone said nothing of it, only rubbed the bone of his thumb, she could feel the love inside her bloom. The Prince, if he would allow himself this power of reliance, would get better. She knew this.

She clung to his hand until he fainted, and, when he awoke in the later afternoon, his plant was readied by his side. Newly rejuvenated and ready to go home.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Birthday, Jae!!!!


End file.
